Active disease management generally requires a constant exchange of information between a patient, the patient's family, a caregiver, and a health-care professional (e.g., a physician). The health-care professional may seek regular diagnostic information regarding one or more conditions. The patient, the patient's family, and/or the caregiver may seek feedback associated with any changes in the diagnostic information. Acquiring regular diagnostic information, however, generally presents a significant challenge, especially for a health-care professional. For example, the patient may not be able to visit the health-care professional at adequate intervals due to time and/or cost constraints. A handheld medical testing and monitoring device may provide a cost-effective means with which to ensure constant communication between the patient and the health-care professional. An exemplary handheld medical testing and monitoring device is ONETOUCH, which is manufactured by JOHNSON AND JOHNSON.
The handheld medical testing and monitoring device may be configured to acquire diagnostic data related to a given condition at a given interval. For example, a diabetes-related monitoring device, such as ONETOUCH, may test the blood glucose level of a patient by collecting blood via a lancet prick and testing the collected blood. After the handheld medical testing and monitoring device acquires the blood glucose level of the patient, the handheld medical testing and monitoring device may transmit the blood glucose level over a network to a remote computer where the data is analyzed by, for example, the remote computer and/or a health-care professional. Based on patient's blood glucose level, the health-care professional may provide feedback, such as updated care information, to the patient, the patient's family, and/or the caregiver. Therefore, with the handheld medical testing and monitoring device, the health-care professional may remotely gather regular diagnostic information from the patient. With the regular diagnostic information, the health-care professional may timely provide the patient, the patient's family, and/or the caregiver potentially life-saving feedback in response to changes in the patient's diagnostic information.